She gathered up her clothing, but she could not dress in the dark in the complicated finery of an evening dress. Fortunately, Cloris had lent her a dressing gown as well as a bed gown so that she need not steal through the halls of Durham House quite undressed. She pushed her feet into her flimsy pumps and stole from the room. For an instant she paused, as Cloris’s blustery breathing halted, choked, and resumed.
Thanks to the multiplicity of windows in this, the Stuart part of the house, Maris did not need a candle. The moon shone in with enough strength to make even the spidery writing on the map clear. She needed it, having taken a wrong turn somewhere between the early and late Stuart periods.
The house was deeply silent, yet every now and then, especially near a staircase, she would hear a distant sound of voices, too far-off to be understood. Once, she could have sworn she heard a chorus of singing, rather dim and faraway, yet giving an impression of boisterousness. Somewhere a few choice spirits were making a night of it. Though glad that someone else was awake in the vast house, Maris thought she would be wise to avoid that company.
Passing through another endless hall, she heard snoring the equal of Cloris’s and she wondered, stifling another giggle, if the man was single. Surely here was Cloris’s ideal mate. Why ruin the sleep of two innocent people when they could marry each other? Of course, the plaster on their bedroom ceiling would probably collapse.
After what seemed an eternity, Maris finally recognized a bronze nymph shyly offering a bowl of fruit that stood at the entrance to her own hall. Now more tired than even before, Maris dragged herself toward the sanctuary of her bedchamber. It didn’t matter if the room stank of worse things than Lilah’s lavender scent. All she wanted now was a bed, or even a reasonably flat surface, and quiet.
“Miss?” someone called from behind her. Wearily, she turned about to find that same sturdy footman, holding high a branch of candles. An empty birdcage dangled from his other hand. “Are you lost, miss? And no wonder if you are, such a place as I never saw.”
“No, thank you.” Maris remembered to be polite. “My room is just here.”
“I’ll light your way, then.”
“Thank you. I beg your pardon,” Maris said on an afterthought. “I thought I heard ...are there still people awake downstairs?”
His impudent grin flashed. “That there are. The young master’ll sleep all day tomorrow and so will most of the others. You young ladies will have to do without ‘em till nuncheon.”
“I doubt many of us will be awake any earlier.”
They reached her door at last. “Good night.” She was far too tired to ask about the birdcage. She noticed with vague relief that there were no birds in it.
“Good night to you.”
He held up his branch of candles just far enough so that she could see a foot beyond the open door. She noticed that Lilah had left a candle burning in her room and so dismissed the footman.
Hardly had she stepped on her own carpet than she realized that the light flowed over the gleaming naked chest of Lord Danesby, standing beside the bed, his fine linen shirt in his hand. “Miss Lindel?” he said, pure shock turning his voice husky.
Maris closed the door. “You know,” she said, a laugh trembling in her throat, “when I saw a similar scene on the stage last week, I thought it highly improbable. “
He raised his arms to pull his shirt over his head once again. Maris glanced away in haste but she noticed that the shirt was marred. It had a thin red stain over the heart. His voice, though muffled by the folds of the shirt, could still demand a response. “What are you doing here?”
Maris felt surprise but no embarrassment at having him in her room. She couldn’t very well start screaming after they’d already exchanged civilities.
“I was warned that one could easily become confused in this house. Are you certain you did not lose your way, my lord?”
“On the contrary, I think it is you who are lost, Miss Lindel. And what, may I ask, are you doing wandering the halls at this hour?”
She could not betray Cloris’s secret. “I don’t believe that is any of your concern,” she said, raising her chin defiantly.
“You made it my business when you walked through that door.”
“But this is my room.”
“No, it’s mine.” He picked his black coat from the bed and felt in the pockets. “Look. My room is clearly marked on this map.”
Perforce, she took the paper he flourished at her. It was the work of an instant to compare it with her own, still showing her former room. They were cheek by jowl. “But I’m certain . . .” The lingering fragrance in the air gave her an argument. “Miss Paladin spilled that scent earlier this evening. Surely you don’t use it?”
“No.”
“Well, then. Does this look like the room you were shown to when you arrived?”
His breath smelled slightly of alcohol but he didn’t seem at all off balance. “I didn’t see it. I arrived only a few moments before dinner was to commence. Fortunately, I had planned to arrive then and journeyed down in my evening attire.”
“Then who gave you this?”
“The butler.”
They stood close together, puzzling out the mystery. “It’s a well-run household,” Maris said. “Though I suppose mistakes happen even here.”
“I’ve often been a guest here and nothing of the sort has ever happened before. Don’t distress yourself.” He brushed her cheek gently with the backs of his fingers, pushing a loosened lock of hair over her shoulder. “I’ll go at once.”
She caught his sleeve. “Where will you sleep?”
“I’ll return to the youngsters downstairs. They’ll be up for hours yet. If I grow too weary for cards and dice, for I’m no heedless youth anymore, there are sofas and rugs enough to house an army in luxury.”
Maris was about to offer to leave him in possession of the bedroom—Lilah could share with her if she couldn’t bear a return to Cloris—-when the bedroom door flew open.
“Aha!” Mrs. Paladin said, pointing a sharp finger at the surprised couple. “As I thought!”
Kenton instinctively interposed his body between Maris and the door. Nothing could be more innocent or appear more damaging than his presence in Maris Lindel’s bedchamber. As though he walked through a picture gallery of Mr. Hogarth’s satirical sketches, he could see small images of the inevitable consequences—-threatened scandal, a forced proposal, a quick and quiet wedding, and all the misery of marriage to an incompatible woman.
Yet, like a gleam of light striking the last picture, he could believe that there were worse fates in the world than marriage to Miss Lindel. He wondered if Maris liked roses and how she would feel about traveling the world. As a companion, her viewpoint would be, he felt certain, unique.
Mrs. Paladin’s shrilling broke in on his thoughts. “Little did I think that you would sink so low, my lord, as to seduce an innocent girl under this of all roofs!”
“Don’t be absurd,” he said coldly. “This is the last place I would have chosen.” He heard Maris give a snort of muffled laughter from behind him and tried to stifle his answering smile.
“How can you stand there and grin at me? Are you entirely dead to shame, sir? You must do right by her. Thank God she has a devoted mother to look out for her interests!”
Already doors were opening in the hall. Kenton thought wryly that it was to Mrs. Paladin’s advantage to have as many witnesses as possible to the theatrical storm she was brewing. They were unnecessary, however. He had every intention of settling the situation in the only honorable fashion, even though the scandal was none of his doing. He began to wonder whose doing it was.
“Mother?”
Mrs. Paladin broke off her tirade between one syllable and the next as Lilah emerged from her bedroom to stand, rubbing her eyes, beside her. At nearly the same instant, Maris stepped out from behind the shelter of Kenton’s shoulder. The stunned widening of Mrs. Paladin’s eyes, the way she pressed her hand t
o her heart as she stepped back, told him that she’d had no notion the girls had changed rooms.
The slight catch in Maris’s breathing told Kenton that she, too, had caught the subtleties of the situation. He put his hand to his pocket. The only time he’d seen Mrs. Paladin had been when the entire party had crowded onto a portico at the back of the house to watch the pyrotechnics in honor of Cloris Osbourne’s presentation to the Queen. It would have been an easy matter to abstract one map from his pocket and slip in another. One wouldn’t even need to be a particularly good pickpocket.
He’d been distracted both by the fireworks and by the perceived necessity to avoid Maris’s company. He’d bowed politely when they passed each other, but had made no attempt to single her out, though he was most impatient to hear her view of the drawing room.
If Mrs. Paladin had a guilty conscience, she made a splendid recovery. “What will your mother say? She left you in my charge. I feel I have failed her.”
Other faces were peering at them around the door frame now, other guests, a servant or two. Some looked shocked, some titillated, pointing and whispering. A few even appeared to be envious. Kenton knew they must present a very pointed moral lesson—Illicit Lovers Discovered or something of that ilk. Maris wore a simple dressing gown of golden yellow wool, her honey-colored hair shading into it where it lay loose and waving over her shoulders, pouring down from beneath a rakishly tilted cap.
“Mrs. Paladin,” she began, embarking on an explanation that would be useless.
He interrupted. “We’d do better to discuss this matter privately. If you’ll enter, Mrs. Paladin?”
“I also,” Lilah said, crossing the lapels of her own dressing gown high on her chest. “This concerns me a little, too.”
“Indeed.” For the rest, he waited until the two Paladins were within and then firmly closed the door in the other guests’ faces. Then he turned to face the women, his arms crossed on his chest. “Well, now...”
“Mother, how could you? This is going too far,” Lilah proclaimed, evidently understanding her mother’s perfidy at first glance. “Are you so unalterably opposed to my marrying Mr. Preston that you must drag his lordship in to stop it?”
“Who is Mr. Preston?” Kenton asked.
Raising her voice to be heard over Mrs. Paladin swearing violently that she was pure in heart, Maris explained, “I have no doubt that he is a most amiable and determined man for Lilah could have accepted nothing less in her mate.”
“I don’t know. I’ve known some clever women make a bad bargain when they marry.”
“Not Lilah. She knows what she wants. She’ll get it, too, mark my words.”
“I confess my anxiety at this moment is not for Miss Paladin’s future, but yours.”
“Mine? Don’t worry over that. I don’t.”
“You should.”
Mrs. Paladin turned to him again. “You must do right by Maris, my lord. Isn’t it enough that you and Mrs. Armitage between you have already sullied her name that you must break into her room as well?”
To Kenton’s ears, her protestations echoed of the stage. He wondered if she took her dialogue from the same play Maris had said she’d seen.
Despite his distaste for her histrionics, he knew he was in duty bound to offer for Maris, no matter whose machinations had brought them together. He turned toward her, finding her looking at him, her lips shut tight as though upon hasty words.
“My dear Miss Lindel,” he began. “Maris ...”
Hard upon a knock, the door opened. Lady Osbourne, followed by her insignificant lord, strode in. “What is the meaning of this?”
Mrs. Paladin began to explain, only to be fixed like an insect on a pin by Lady Osbourne’s powerful gaze. “Are you pitching this taradiddle, Elvira? What nonsense!”
Lord Osbourne added, “Indeed.”
“No one need to have known anything about this matter if you had not seen fit to start screeching the house down. Or was that your intention? Did you mean to create as much scandal as possible? It seems hard on Miss Lindel that she should suffer for your ambition.”
“This was my room,” Lilah said. “Mother didn’t know we’d exchanged as it happened after she retired.”
“Ah, that explains it. I didn’t imagine that Elvira possessed so much altruism that she’d give Danesby’s fortune to Miss Lindel rather than to her own flesh and blood.”
“By all means, say what you choose about me, Julia, just as though I had no ears.”
“Pish,” Lady Osbourne returned. “I’m not such a fool that I cannot see what is behind this pretty scene. Danesby’s morals may not be all one could wish but I believe he has enough respect for me not to plan seductions under my roof.”
Lord Osbourne intoned, “Indeed.”
“Thank you, Aunt Julia. You have my leave to say what you choose about me.”
“You are at least a gentleman, Danesby, not a counterjumper or a once-a-week beau. There are some things a gentleman does not stoop to. Seducing young ladies of good family is surely one of them.”
“Thank you, Aunt Julia.”
“Then I needn’t marry him,” Marls said, speaking for the first time.”
“Not marry him?” Lady Osbourne said incredulously. “Of course you must marry him, and at once.”
“Indeed,” Lord Osbourne said, not unkindly.
“I shall send to Doctor’s Commons for a special license at once. I wonder when they are open. If all goes well, you can be married before we all go back to town.”
Turning his back on them, as the three older people began to discuss the hows and wherefores of this hasty marriage, Kenton took Maris’s hands in his own. They moved to clasp his, trembling, though her eyes were calm enough.
“It must be,” he said, so softly that he didn’t believe even Miss Paladin, standing near, could hear him. “I offer you the protection of my name and the tenderness of my high regard. You need never fear that I will demand from you anything that you are not willing to give freely.”
She gazed up at him with those wide eyes, so filled with the sweetness of dreams. In that instant, Kenton realized that Flora Armitage’s guess had been right. Maris was in love with him. He hardly had time to understand this and to try to assimilate it when she blinked, her gaze hardening as it met his.
“No.”
* * * *
They’d been railing at her for half an hour, even Lord Osbourne managing a sentence of two words. They all had different reasons for their insistence, yet returned again and again to her utter ruination if she went from Durham House as an unmarried girl. She only shook her head, unable to take back her refusal or even to soften it.
Lord Danesby said nothing, only watching them from a window seat, his blue-sleeved arms crossed over his chest and his cravat hanging loose around his neck. She could not tell from his expression what he was thinking. Maris tried not to look at him for fear her resolve would weaken,
“No,” she said again. “I am very grateful to his lordship. However, I hardly feel that this accident, if I may call it so, needs such a drastic remedy as marriage. Do people have such a low opinion of his lordship or of me—yes, of me—to believe that we would do anything the least bit improper? You may call your own footman as a witness, Lady Osbourne. I was in this room not more than five minutes before Mrs. Paladin appeared.”
“When I heard the door shut for the second time I feared something was amiss,” Mrs. Paladin said.
“So your ears were on the prick?” Lady Osbourne said with a scoffing snort. “As I thought.”
“The second time?” Lord Danesby asked.
‘‘When the door closed the first time, I assumed Lilah had returned at last to her own room. When I heard it again, I knew she could not be alone. I went to her at once to see what was amiss. I did not realize that she’d given her room to Maris,” she said in a sharply disillusioned tone. Maris realized that having a daughter married to the wealthy and fashionable Lord Danesby would have been both
a feather in her cap and a bird in the hand. She need never fear poverty or debtors’ prison with such a son-in-law. Now all this had come to nothing because her daughter had spilled scent, forcing her to give up her room.
Mrs. Paladin threw one last argument forward. “Think of your mother. Think of what your father would say.”
Maris laughed. Kenton leaned forward, his elbows coming to rest on his knees. He felt the bands of steel around his heart unlatch, giving him his first full breath in what seemed like days.
“My father?” Maris said. She put aside Lilah’s supporting arm, patting her hand in gratitude before standing alone in front of three disapproving faces. Kenton watched in admiration, giving her her moment.
“My father would have told me to stop being such a damned fool. I will not sell my soul to salvage my reputation, not even for his lordship and ten thousand pounds.”
Chapter Ten
The journey from Yorkshire had been interminably long and utterly exhausting, yet Maris felt a surge of excitement as the coach passed through Finchley. She looked greedily at each person walking down the main street, eager for the sight of familiar faces. “Look, Mother, it’s Mrs. Pike.” But they’d driven past before her mother could rouse herself to wave.
Mr. and Mrs. Cosby, their “couple,” were standing on the doorstep, Mrs. Cosby’s apron dazzlingly bright in the golden afternoon light. “Oh, ma’am,” she called before the door even opened to discharge them. “Oh, ma’am.”
Sophie was first down the steps, a Sophie whose radiant health glowed in her cheeks. “Why, Miss Sophie,” Mrs. Cosby said, receiving her embrace with startled delight. “Have you grown?”
“Good Yorkshire air, my darling Cosby. I’ve gained nearly a stone and all my gowns have been let down. Isn’t it ridiculous?”
Maris followed her mother. For her, the sojourn in Yorkshire had not been so healthy. In fact, her gown hung on her now. She tied her sashes more tightly and hoped no one would notice. Her mother had such joy in Sophie’s improvement she would not lessen it for the world.
After greeting the Cosbys, Maris hurried to her room, seeing everything with new eyes. The pink hangings of her room seemed far too sweet now, the pictures of rustic scenes insipid. There were etchings of Grecian ruins in her father’s dressing room. Her mother would not mind if she abstracted them. She remembered seeing some blue damask, too heavy for a dress but ideal for drapes.
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